Last week, the Quebec government of Premier Jean Charest
announced that it would extend a $58 million loan to Balcorp, a Montreal company that owns the Jeffrey Asbestos Mine in Asbestos, Quebec, which has been closed since November.
After town representatives met with state environmental officials, Eden select board members say solar
could make sense at the site of the town’s abandoned asbestos mine.
State environmental officials are
continuing to float the idea of building a renewable energy project on the site
of the abandoned asbestos mine in Eden and Lowell. Voters in the towns refused last month to
declare the mine a Superfund site, which would have provided money to clean it
up.
The federal and state government can’t afford to clean up an abandoned asbestos
mine in northern Vermont now that voters have rejected a Superfund designation
for the site. That’s
the word from the state Agency of Natural Resources, and the EPA.
Voters
in Eden and Lowell have overwhelmingly rejected the idea of adding a closed
asbestos mine to the national list of Superfund hazardous waste sites. A
Superfund designation would have put the property in line for federal cleanup
money.
Two
Northeast Kingdom towns will vote next month on whether to have an
abandoned asbestos mine declared a Superfund hazardous waste site. The
state argues that the Superfund listing could bring in federal money to clean
up the site.
The Vermont Supreme Court says a landowner
can sue the president of the Vermont Asbestos Group over contamination on
property next to a former asbestos mine in Eden and Lowell.